Bio
Tim Berry, president of Palo Alto Software Inc., started creating his own software for business planning and forecasting to bridge what he calls "the know-how gap" that exists between what personal computers can potentially do for businesspeople and what they are actually doing.
"At Stanford in the late 1970s, we took an entire course to learn how to do a business plan," Tim recalls. "Nowadays personal computers have made all of that much easier, but only when people know how to use them. I don't mean simple computer or software training, but the management techniques like cash flows, financial analysis and forecasting models. What we do is share and explain the thinking tools as well as the technical tools."
In 1999, Tim wrote On Target: The Book on Marketing Plans, with his co-author, Doug Wilson, CPA's Guide to Business Planning, published first in 1998 by Harcourt Brace, republished by Aspen Publishers, and Hurdle: The Book on Business Planning, now in its fifth edition and included in Business Plan Pro, as well as several other books on business planning with spreadsheets that were published in the 1980s by Dow-Jones-Irwin, Microtext/McGraw-Hill and Hayden Books. His business software has been published by both Palo Alto Software and M&T Publishing.
Tim's been a professional business planner since 1974, as an editorial-research director for Business International, as vice president of Creative Strategies, as a consultant to Apple Computer, as a co-founder and member of the board of directors of Borland International, and as president and founder of Palo Alto Software. He's given seminars on business planning in 13 countries on four continents in two languages. He's also been a guest on Jim Blasingame's nationally syndicated radio show, The Small Business Advocate, and is a member of the show's brain trust.
Tim holds an MBA from Stanford University, an MA with honors from the University of Oregon, and a BA magna cum laude from the University of Notre Dame. He's a former wire service news and business magazine foreign correspondent. In January 2007, he receivied the Corporate Entrepreneur of the Year Award from the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship.
In addition to overseeing the day-to-day duties of running Palo Alto Software, he's also an adjunct professor at the University of Oregon, where he teaches an introductory course on entrepreneurship.